Thursday, August 9, 2012

Sorry About the Delay

1:52 p.m. August 9, 2012
I had been meaning to throw up a post yesterday and was planning on doing so but I of course fell asleep around quarter after twelve.  A little disappointing but I'm not too concerned as I've picked up a new attitude towards this experiment that I'll share later in the post.

First off, two days ago was not a very good day.  I woke up at five right on schedule then I took a quick nap that turned into a one hour nap from nine to ten.  Then my afternoon nap went fine enough but I fell asleep at about eleven; much too early.  That day was pretty bad but yesterday went better.  Yesterday everything went according to plan except that I fell asleep about half an hour early as I shared before.

And today I got up at seven and am going to have my nap in five minutes.

The reason I'm not too concerned about sometimes sleeping in or missing naps is firstly because this is an experiment and secondly, few people actually live their live in such specific and exact schedules.  I realize that's not always the case with polyphasic sleep cycles but it's still applicable.  I view going to bed half an hour or an hour early the same as I would if I was just doing one big block of sleeping.  It's not a big deal.  If you disagree you can leave your comment but this feels like a huge burden being lifted.  Until tomorrow or the next day, have a great sleep!

6 comments:

  1. You should be concerned. An experiment has "controls" which means you have to follow the protocol, otherwise the results are not interpretable. If you can't follow a system, then you won't learn anything (other than that you can't follow a system).

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  2. That's true to a certain point; however I am following the protocol, just more loosely than I had originally intended. As far as the experiment portion goes, the results are very interpretable and there is much to learn, even if that includes that I can't follow the specific system. It's all new and something to learn from. Thank you for your comment though.

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  3. Well, it does completely change the parameters of your experiement, and could in fact spell the end of the whole thing.

    You have your result, it is not possible for you to keep to such a rigid schedule, and by "sleeping in" on weekends you are adapting to a more manageable sleeping pattern. Your body is craving more sleep, and is making sure you get it.

    Nothing wrong with that, in fact it is healthy. But it does mean that your experiment has more or less failed.

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  4. I have to wonder why you doing this when there is already a large body of scientific evidence to show that it is not possible to maintain such a schedule without incurring serious neurological and physical decrements. Is it purely for fun, or are you not aware of the science and therefore under the misapprehension that this could work?

    Just to give you the short of it: There is no free lunch. All the existing evidence shows that you cannot make sleep more efficient by spreading it out. In fact, you are likely to make it less efficient due to the inherent difficulties in sleeping at phases when your circadian rhythm is promoting wakefulness. Your particular schedule does at least conform to times when it is relatively easy to sleep (night and mid-afternoon). But 5 hours per day is simply not enough. The longer you attempt to stay on this schedule, the larger the chronic deficit you will accrue, and the more difficulty you will have in staying awake, especially in quiet or dark environments.

    For as long as you continue to do this, I have to strongly advice you against driving, especially at night.

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  5. I'm guessing you gave up on this experiment?

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